Smart Water Futures
Designing the next generation
of urban drinking water systems

Water-Futures answers the question: “How should the world achieve the provisioning of high-quality water services in the future while facing severe climate, economic and population pressures, under deep uncertainty?”

Nearly 80% of the world’s population is exposed to high levels of threat to water security due to anthropogenic climate change*

*(Vörösmarty, C.J., McIntyre, P.B., Gessner, M.O., Dudgeon, D., Prusevich, A., Green, P., Glidden, S., Bunn, S.E., Sullivan, C.A., Liermann, C.R. and Davies, P.M., 2010. Global threats to human water security and river biodiversity. Nature, 467(7315), p.555).

We face a future where limited water resources will become even more precious*

*(Rodell, M., Famiglietti, J.S., Wiese, D.N., Reager, J.T., Beaudoing, H.K., Landerer, F.W. and Lo, M.H., 2018. Emerging trends in global freshwater availability. Nature, 557(7707), p.651).

By 2050, 70% of the world’s population will live in urban areas*

*(United Nations (UN), the Department of Economic and Social Affairs, 2018. World Urbanization Prospects: The 2018 Revision, Key Facts. United Nations Department of Economics and Social Affairs, Population Division: New York, NY, USA).

To deal with uncertain climate conditions, we need a holistic, intelligent decision-making framework for managing water in cities of the future*

*(United Nations (UN), the Department of Economic and Social Affairs, 2018. World Urbanization Prospects: The 2018 Revision, Key Facts. United Nations Department of Economics and Social Affairs, Population Division: New York, NY, USA).

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